Grrl Power #1336 – Budget anxiety
“Also I haven’t worn my hair straight like that since Friends went off the air. And I want the doll to be more fit. I want little girls wanting to grow up looking like athletes, not one missed meal away from terminal malnutrition!”
Profligate? Just say opulent, Max. Although “profligate” does specifically mean “reckless waste; wildly extravagant / Licentiousness” (Licentiousness meaning “The quality of being lewd and lascivious”) Definitions that require you to look up words used in the definition amuse me. Profligate is definitely one of those Word of the Day calendar words that makes people arch a brow when you break it out. It’s a perfectly cromulent word, it’s just conspicuous due to exceeding the rarity threshold.
I feel like there’s one page in the 1300+ I’ve done so far where Sydney has bought, or at least mentioned buying something extravagant. Or… maybe I mentioned it in the comments somewhere? At a minimum, she considers the inventory of the comic shop “hers.” Not in a “I’ll shut you other comic co-owners out and keep it all, mwoo-hah-hah!” way. More of a “I want that $300 polystone Wonder Woman statue, so I’ll leave the at-cost price in the till and take it with me.” So… basically just buying it. She did drop ten grand in her new swear jar though. That was probably her most extravagant expense since joining the team. And, well… she probably chipped in to have that one plane steam cleaned and detailed. Deus didn’t charge her for burning 10-ish square kilometers of crops and assorted countryside though.
I love Mystery Science Theater and basically all the stuff those guys have done since, and Rifftrax is having a new Kickstarter for their annual live show. So I am pimping it here. Oh, the movie they’re doing is Timecop, and I can’t imagine it not being amazing. Last year was Point Break, which I had actually never seen before. Honestly, that movie was just the peak of bonkers 80’s action films. Yeah, I know, it’s a 1991 film. I stand by my assessment.
I’m going to try something with this new vote incentive.
This month, I’m closing on a new house, selling my Mom’s house, finishing packing Mom’s house, moving city to city to the new house, forwarding mail, canceling utilities, all that. And after that’s done, I get to start the process of selling my old house, which needs a little work before it can realistically go on the market.
SO. I’m going to try and do this vote incentive in stages. Currently it’s just pencils. The TopWebcomics one will update with colors and detail until we get to the no clothes versions, then that will continue over at Patreon. Also there will be a comic or two in between each version to fill out the story.
I know it’s hard to tell from just the pencils, but this is Heatwave and Jiggawatt. The comics will explain why they’re doing what they’re doing. Although I feel like even saying that much makes it easy to guess, but hopefully the journey will still amuse.
Double res version will be posted over at Patreon. Feel free to contribute as much as you like.
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Magneto would NOT be tolerated in the Real World like he is in the Marvel Universe, especially by Supers
I dunno, I’m thinking that with the way things are going he might have a point.
There’s a reason he’s become a much more sympathetic character over the decades.
Cause, yes.
Means no.
He is a terrorist armed with weapons of mass destruction.
Yep, seeing any civil rights protest get the “Iraq WMD treatment” in that exact way, it’s obvious Magneto would not be tolerated in the real world like he is in the Marvel Universe. Especially true of USA politics. The last decade has been enlightening about what subcategory of people are allowed to be people, and who can get disappeared in unmarked vans, shot in broad daylight, put in a cage, outlawed etc.
Mutants deemed “existential WMDs” for the ruling class? That’s goodbye.
It’s Dr X who wouldn’t be tolerated.
Magneto wouldn’t give them a choice.
I know, that class of people who has never done anything violent.
Trump could be seen as a terorist transformin US into the bigest rogue state.
To secure the deal of rare earths in Ukraine … He sided with Russia …
He had threatened to invade EU , Greenland is a part of EU and many EU countries are in now defunct NATO…for the same rare earths.
Perhaps because it’s a need of the X-Nazi ,promoting Afd sucessor of the Nazi party in germany, Petain leftovers in France , and finding the bigot Nigel Farage insufficiently nazi too Victorian
My country was now protecting one of is old enemy – we made peace in the 1960’s – against Russia. Making the job of over 40 US military installations in Germany…
Your country elected an apprentice dictator , and sided against is oldest ally …
And for me a French , listening J.D Vance, throwing under the bus US loyal sidekick beyond his own interest U.K…
Is the epitome of pettiness and treason , a total betrayal of his most loyal ally …
Being america ally is just a stupidity under current management , and I doubt they will quit voluntarily if the polls are against them.
France US alliance 1778-2025
Killed by Orange Agent and the Cyber trollminator
* we had been allies , cautious against another bu allies
The US has been turning against its allies since Washington turned his coat inside out, so stop blaming Trumpet
You probably also believe the lies that Trump built the wall against Mexico
With as many US bases are in the EU they are already invaded.
But the EU is not an ally of the US, it is a parasite. It is a group of 500 million people demanding a country with 300 million bank roll its national defense so that its people can have affordable healthcare, vacations and 35 hour work weeks.
…And everything is politics, can’t have a webcomic be entertaining w/o someone trying to bring it back around to their latest perceived outrage.
Whole website became anathema unless you were a political junkie and/or delusional.
The burden of real time information, is that people make claims w/o having finished the chapter much less the book that shows the whole story.
If not for pro-status quo authorial fiat, any ‘people with powers’ community getting half the crap MU supers get from hateful, paranoid, and ungrateful Muggles would have quickly switched en masse to a Magneto-like viewpoint, staged a revolution, took over the world, and put the idiots in their place long ago. Or at least being alienated into standing apart when the next apocalyptic threat shows up every other month. In a realistic setting, to Bully a Dragon is suicidal and always ends in tragedy for the Too Dumb to Live actors.
Storm, by herself, has the ability to destroy or create 50 Billion dollar hurricanes. That’s in addition to bringing water to crops and putting out fires.
In real life she gets paid millions of dollars and becomes a A-list celeb. We’re not going to refuse to do that because she’s black and has white hair.
I think the point is that Storm likely won’t work for or accept payment from anyone who has a bad record of treating Mutants, including those who have passed laws discriminating against them. In universe, that is exactly what many nations have done, which is why Storm isn’t super rich and famous, because there is enough fear mongering and low level powered mutants for the public to brutalize.
Dragons don’t exist ,IRL , no power is impervious , napoleon 7 coalition , UK 2 world wars, Germany ditto – for the military standpoint -, and passing to the verge of collapse (China 1970) to a superpower (China 2025) is pretty rapid.
And now in 2025 the soft power of US is suffering of a self deletion …
In 1776 it’s a ragtag bunch of nobodies without army and without any good general Georges Washington as the commander of Virginia Regiment during the French and Indian War (1754–1763), hadn’t had a good record against U.K a superpower.
Magento isn’t “tolerated” he’s a terrorist with extremely potent superpowers and has a following of other superhumans.
And remains at large despite the multiple genocide attempts.
Dude is just really hard to handle.
Last panel: yes, dresses and flying don’t mix very well.
Neither do togas, but those don’t seem to be in fashion much anymore.
Dresses are not good for a lot more than flying that superheroines do for much more compelling reasons than modesty. At least unless you a Magical Girl Warrior with a lot of plot armor. However there is the obvious, trope-y alternative of skintight/skimpy costumes that a lot of iconic supers use, is very convenient for the job, and way better than fatigues or casual for merchandise.
Besides fanservice, it is optimal for people that need to fight in close quarters and move around a lot, do not have any use for mundane weapons and armor, are blessed with ideal bodies, and usually proud to flaunt them. Ask martial artists, gymnasts, and other athletes that face similar circumstances.
Ofc, such an argument would be anathema for Maxi given her body issues, prudery, and militant sex-negative feminism, but (thankfully) she is the exception among Superion-field channelers and mutahumans in other superhero settings.
Aye, that’s as may be, but ye go flyin’ in a kilt, and yer fan mail doubles, don’t it?
No, no it does in point of fact go up. Unless you forgot to do the laundry. You go rolling around barbwire, thistles, blackberries, huckleberries and various and sundry pointy, stingy, skin irritating things, you’ll learn. And don’t get me started on -40c, deep snow and “wtaf did that patch of ice, I hope I didn’t break anything”
IOW: the whole don’t wear underwear thing was bs invented to mess with the english. Now back to henching, it appears the boss’s weaponized cats and goats are coming along nicely if slowly. (sigh)
It’s not so much the dresses and flying, it’s that dress she is opposed to (her skin may be shiny, doesn’t mean she wants her clothes to out-shine her skin)
Looks like a copy of Action Comics #1 is in the single digit millions. She might not have that in her bank account even with a very generous paycheck, but she can definitely easily get a loan to buy a copy if she wants to.
1) I know it’s still not shaded but for some reason I feel like today’s art is REALLY good. Better than even normally.
2) Norm and Cliff from Cheers lol.
Norm!
Your second point is what I was here to applaud. I read that in their voices and the theme song has been randomly going through my head, which makes me smile. Someone put together a supercut of every Norm interaction on Cheers (not just the “NORM!” but when he has a little back and forth with someone while he’s walking to his stool. It’s about 30 minutes long, and it’s great. “How does a beer sound, Norm?” “No idea, one’s never lasted long enough to get a word in.” is one that sticks out.
“What would you say to a beer, Norm?”
“Daddy wuvs oo.”
And
“What’s shakin’ Norm?”
“All four cheeks and a couple of chins.”
Thanks! I wish I had time to add a little more color depth. Maybe I’ll have time to return to these pages in the future hah hah hah hah /gun.
I’d think that materials for Parfait summoning cost more than 10k and could be called “extravagant expense” (it was mentioned that there were cheaper alternatives. Including not summoning her).
The Super situation here is also more different (and reasonable) that most other supers.
1) Good Government based Super Hero Team.
Getting the heavy hitters with you by just paying good money and acting reasonably make the government join up option a lot easier and more viable than running around in a costume to fight crime.
Also having heavy hitters helps rather than getting the B or C class supers while the A and S rank supers are all freelance. Meaning you know the supers can reach you quickly and come down hard on you.
2) Reasonable Villains
Dues being a reasonable long term focused super villain who enjoys his silly gimmicks and knows the difference between being an opposing force and being a jerk.
He keeps some of the villains in line by being a reasonable alternative… Like the murder knife. He found completely justified reasons and methods to recharge the knife without going on a murder spree within a city. Also he pays very well solving the money issue for more than a few villains.
Even the demon army had a reasonable boss who was willing to work with Deus to achieve their main goals together rather than throw a pointless battle or war against one another to claim top villain seat before the heroes were forced to break it up.
Unlike the super minion who was closer to the traditional villain… And we all saw how crazy and dangerous she could be.
3) The introduction.
Yes the whole drowning and blasting a guy’s arm off would make more than a few villains hesitate… There is also a lack of power build up for the villains to mentally prepare themselves with.
spectacular Spider-Man was an example as it was one guy trying to stop crime and the criminals getting super villains made to counter it to the point even if the guy in the animal costume gets stopped… The rest of the low level crooks made up for the loss in profit since they can operate freely.
They got to build up their forces and powers.
This is like dropping Superman without his major villains. The minor villains need more time to organize and work up the courage to stick their heads out to see if they can avoid being hit by the Super Hero strike force team since the rest of the minor villains refuse to stick their heads out to increase the odds and risk their own lives.
Which leaves the major ones who… Lets be honest… Have their own goals and don’t need/want to risk their heads.
So the amount of ‘weekly’ villains are low.
Especially since Supers can quickly get high paying jobs rather than having to rob a bank to pay for their rent next week.
yeah, street crime stops being attractive when you can easily stay afloat with your special talents. then the only crime you may want to commit is white collar crime. but for that you don’t need super powers…
What does this page not account for? An Elon Musk type barging in and bringing a chainsaw to the budget for the sake of trying to shift the country from dollars to cryptocurrency.
Then again, if Musk had tried that in this fictional setting, he would have been Arc Swatted all the way to Mars.
DeerSTALKER, not deerhunter. It’s called a deerstalker. (I was mildly obsessed with Holmes when I was younger)
Also, Holmes never smoked a calabash pipe in the canonical stories; that was an invention of the actor William Gillette, who played Holmes on stage, because it was big enough for the audience to see it. Holmes was described as smoking clay, briar, and cherrywood pipes.
The idea of supers patrolling always vaguely annoyed me. I mean, think about how often one *actually* sees crime happening? What kind of city has daily jewel heists? Unless your super has super senses or a police scanner and the ability to move quickly, they’re not going to be able to *find* the crimes easily.
The BEST method would be to dress in regular clothes and wander the bad parts of town to try and get mugged. Maybe dressed as a little old lady.
. . . I think I’ve just realized how Chimmy spends her evenings.
But we still have partols IRL.
They’re more for PR and to show presence rather than based on whatever chance there is to run into a random crime.
Sydney talked about wanting to buy an infinity-pool, but real cost there is going to be the house that it’s attached to, since you can’t just add a pool on when you live in an apartment.
Though maybe Sydney should consider upgrading her living situation? Perhaps to some where a doorman?
*with a doorman.
So Maxima’s just dropping the Thing That Made Her Go ‘Hmmm” from the last page?
Yes, because that was stupid
I mean, maybe for the moment? And/or she’s just trying to be subtle about it?
If you think someone might possibly be under malicious mental influence, a little gentle probing/conversation seems like a reasonable investigative response before flying off to loudly and publicly accuse whoever’s in the vicinity.
…Okay, call me a five-year-old girl at heart, but I would buy the HELL out of a Maxima barbie.
I’m enjoying the comic but I feel like if it were ever turned into a print edition an editor could go into it and eliminate entire pages just like this one. Sciona is just getting annoying with her refusal to die, so is she going to get found out during this sequence or not? This is a lot of rigamarole to go through just to get to that endpoint, which I would love to see because I’m done with Sciona. We already know Maxima can beat her, so she’s not a credible threat. Her new mind control drug superpower would presumably be useless on Max given it’s well-established that nothing affects Max’s gold skin. So get rid of Sciona and let’s move on. That’s my two cents.
Yeah, Maxi can physically beat E-Sci (and 90% of the rest of the Galaxy), but E-Sci could make Maxi an unwanted threat simply by having her ‘boss’ pass a few innocuous looking bills through congress (or however that crap is done)
Currently watching a show on TV about the yakuza, and how one total arsehole is moving away from the typical criminal crap they do into legitimate business until they become so entrenched no one can touch them
Ms. Scoville, for your TV upgrade, may I recommend the 4K 75″ Hisense U9DG. $3000+shipping+tax.
An LCD behind the LCD acts as a programmable illuminator giving near OLED black levels.
Okay, can see Morph and Anvil, who is Lady Octopus? (what, you thought would have gone with SheSpider?)
Regarding Sydney’s spending habits it is funny how sudden wealth effects people. I know a couple of siblings who inherited a couple of hundred thousand dollars each from their fathers estate. She blew through her share in a couple of years (barrel racing is not a cheap sport) while he still has four cents from his first nickel. I could see where Sydney had to learn to deal with her ADHD by second and even third guessing every purchase. This would be especially true while trying to get a small business off the ground. It’s a habit that persists even after you get some disposable income.
I wonder how long it will take Sydney to realize that she’s rapidly approaching “Fund a Farscape reunion episode” rich.
Hmmmmm. So is Maxima really not going to push Kat on her lapse of memory, or is this just a Syndey-induced break before continuing down that road? Guess we’ll see….
I think Sydney’s largest ‘expense’ was probably that donation to the swear jar after she got back.
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-739-swear-jar-ii-a-filthy-boogaloo/